Hello all, just wanted to introduce myself and my work. My website is http://www.chrisjordan.com; perhaps you have seen my photographs of huge piles of garbage, cell phones, crushed cars, and so on? My new series, called “Running The Numbers,” has appeared a lot in the media lately.

What I am particularly interested in right now is why I am such a hypocrite. In other words, with everything I know about the condition of our world, why am I still consuming at pretty much the same rate as before? Why aren’t my personal consumer behaviors more in line with my beliefs? And in the bigger picture, why are most of us the same way like that? We all seem to be trying to convince everyone ELSE to go green and be more environmentally conscious, while giving ourselves a free pass to do stuff like fly around on jets to attend conferences, drink imported wine and so on.

One defense of mine is to try to convince myself that merely being educated about the green movement is enough; but what matters is what we DO, not what our intentions are. And I, for one, am not doing enough. Why is that, and why is it so hard to change? It is an uncomfortable inquiry, but that’s where I am at at the moment.

Flickr Photos

Credits

This conference is being organized with support from the Kellogg Foundation and the Co-Intelligence Institute. Illustration credits: Dana Lynne Andersen, in From Lava to Life: the Universe Tells our Earth Story by Jennifer Morgan -- Courtesy of Dawn Publications